The present invention relates to a lightweight shrouded turbine blade for use in gas turbines having a thin walled cooled hollow tip shroud.
The use of shrouded gas turbine blades is known in the art. In these blades, the tip shroud of each blade is formed from a solid construction. As a result, the blades are quite heavy. Further, cooling of the tip shroud is very difficult.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a hollow, lightweight shrouded turbine blade.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a turbine blade as above having an improved system for cooling the tip shroud.
The foregoing objects are attained by the shrouded turbine blade of the present invention.
In accordance with the present invention, a shrouded turbine blade comprises an airfoil section and a cored, hollow blade tip shroud joined to the airfoil section. The hollow tip shroud is preferably a cast structure and has a plurality of ribs acting as load bearing structures and defining a plurality of shroud core sections. Each of the shroud core sections communicates with a supply of cooling fluid and has a plurality of apertures for supplying cooling fluid to exterior portions of the shroud.
Other details of the lightweight shrouded turbine blade of the present invention, as well as other objects and advantages attendant thereto, are set forth in the following detailed description and the accompanying drawings wherein like reference numerals depict like elements.